Prior art tape handling cartridges for inputting data into computer memories have provided for the storage of endless loop information-bearing tapes within separate cartridges with the mass of each tape helically coiled around stationary and angularly disposed segments formed in a bin section of its associated cartridge, and with an extended loop of the endless tape positioned in a transport guideway housed within an elongated section of the cartridge, such extended loop leading from a central core in the bin section to form the outermost coil of the tape mass helically coiled around the stationary bin section segments. Upon insertion of the elongated sections of such prior art cartridges into the console of a computer, geared sprockets carried by the cartridges are rendered responsive to a power source of the computer to advance the stored tapes along their transport guideways into readable relationship with a tape reader in the computer, the tapes during such advancement being withdrawn from the innermost coil of the tape masses within the bin sections and thereafter wound around the stationary segments to form the outermost coils of the tape masses. Prior art tape cartridges of the type described are generally provided with geared sprocket assemblies having drum portions that contain parallel and circumferentially disposed grooves for accommodating the sensing pins or interposers of mechanically actuated tape readers, passage of such pins through the codably configured apertures in the information-bearing tapes and into the circumferential grooves formed in the drum portions serving to actuate code bails of a decoding mechanism and to thereby generate multilevel electrical code signals that are utilizable by the memory loader of the computer. A prior art mechanically actuated tape reader is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,562,493 and an endless loop tape handling cartridge for use in association therewith is disclosed in U. S. Pat. No. 3,590,221, both of such patents having issued to Malkowski and assigned to the assignee of the present application.
Prior art tape handling cartridges of the type described supra have necessitated the employment of endless loop tapes, and the difficulty of changing such tapes within the cartridges to thereby make the required number and lengths of tapes available to a computer user have tended to limit and to restrict the utility of such cartridges in the inputting of data into computer memories. Furthermore, the employment of a plurality of such endless loop tape handling cartridges for storing the required number and lengths of tapes and for the selectable inputting of data stored within individual cartridges has proven to be economically impractical and unfeasible. In addition to the disadvantages of known tape handling cartridges that have obtained by reason of the limited utility of endless loop tapes, a further limitation to their utility arises by reason of their exclusive compatability with mechanically actuated memory loaders, which operate in the relatively slow inputting range of approximately 15 coded characters per second, such cartridges being ineffective for use in association with photo-electric memory loaders that are capable of inputting data at a speed of approximately 100 coded characters per second.